The PVP Diaries #85

I cannot graduate to full paranoia. I just can’t. When the Governor or his office or whatever) says this:

“We recognize this will cause financial hardship for many businesses and the governor and staff are exploring ways to mitigate the impacts.“

I cannot make the leap to that popular skepticism that says it’s a lie, a verbal palliative that’s meant to ease us unknowingly to our demise. When I read it I believe it, and I actually do have some sympathy for the people, including the Governor, who has to figure out where to get another 20, 50, 100 million dollars to help people, from a populace that is deep blue, deep democrat, and yet growing loudly dissatisfied with the ever-increasing taxes coming down. Here in Seattle we’re already waiting anxiously to find out what kind of a tax increase (likely a hike in the vehicle tab fees) we’ll be facing to help pay for our West Seattle Bridge repair and/or replacement.

Ultimately, I stand on what I said in a previous post somewhere: that it’s fun to rend garments and imagine a tyrannical government peopled by power mongers who want to see our human faces under the boot, but it falls apart when you realize that nobody wants to rule that particular world. Power is powerful, and intoxicating, and without a doubt politicians become entranced by it, seduced by it, but nobody wants to govern poverty and illness.

Anyway. The kids will still have soccer practice, they just have to wear a mask throughout. That’ll be fun. I can’t get caught up pointing out inconsistencies and contradictions, in wondering with intentional verbosity why this activity is ok, but that one isn’t. Why we think it’s fine to put in our cart an apple that has probably been touched by half a dozen people in the past hour at least, but that if we don’t follow the one-way signs in the aisle we are in grave danger. In the end, the only time someone is complaining about any particular restriction is when it impinges on something he really wants to do.

I should probably note that I write this on the heels of Governor Inslee’s address yesterday, announcing a return to some of the restrictions we had in the Spring and Summer. Nothing earth-shattering, really. As I have been doing since this so-called “third wave” began, I continue to look at the rates of death and hospitalizations. And still, while the number of positive cases generally screams upward, those two numbers do not follow suit:

On April 17, deaths were at 6.7% of all positive cases. 2.4% today. The degree of severity seems very definitely to have declined. Getting COVID no longer carries as high a likelihood that you will need the hospital or the mortician. It was never all that high to begin with, but even less so now. Whatever. This all sounds like so much inconsequential blather. But hey, posterity, The Record, and all that.